For about an hour after “Fabulation, or the Re-Education of Undine” (it makes sense in the context of one of the play’s best moments, but damned if I’m actually going to write it out each time), I walked around in a kind of shocked appreciation, the stupor of being in the presence of something fleetingly, unevenly true. The production, under Isiah Wooden’s direction, has some problems, but the moments that work do so beautifully.
Written by McArthur “Genius” Grant winner Leah Nottage, this play is fantastically full, with layers and themes, motifs, dreams of fish and equations on napkins. The dialogue is both realistic and beautiful, showing the poetry of everyday language and expressions. The story and characterization manage to explore many levels of African-American experience, without being “about the African-American experience.”
Mostly. There are occasional heavy-handed vignettes that don’t really work within the story. There’s just a bit too much coincidence, and a few blatant and forced moments of one character walking away, then calling back to say something pivotally ridiculous like “Are you happy?”
The genius of the play is that it doesn’t beat you over the head with its themes, but unfortunately the direction lacks the subtlety of the writing. Every feeling is played to the hilt; every expression is turned up to eleven. It becomes sort of numbing to watch so much constant intensity, and the truly revelatory moments can get a bit lost. The drama would come through better with a little more realism, a little more up and down to show the heights.
But the talented cast slips seamlessly in and out of a myriad of roles. I sometimes forgot that it was the same actress playing the long-suffering mother and the sassy financial planner, which is the highest praise I can give. Particular praise goes to Carolyn Chambers (COL ’11), especially in her roles as the Grandma and as the receptionist, and to Shirley Norman (COL ’08), in all her wonderful iterations. Robert Klein (MSB ’09), playing protagonist Undine’s multiple romantic interests, is careful and sincere enough to make one-dimensional characters real and convincing. Unfortunately, except for some of the main characters, the other people involved tend to be exaggerated, played as caricature, which undercuts both the cast’s abilities and the characters’ meaning.
Obehi Utubor (SFS ’09), who plays Undine herself, is a girl with real talent, and really gorgeous arms. Both these assets, however, occasionally get in her way. She moves around too much, which can be distracting and disorienting. She can command a stage and drive home every line, but sometimes she doesn’t tone it down when she should. She showboats a bit; she shows rather than feels her emotions. Undine often breaks the fourth wall and speaks to the audience, a tricky business at the best of times, and Utubor’s overemphasis means sometimes it’s hard to tell when she is playing towards her fellow actors or playing toward the audience.
“Fabulation” is stagy, a little overdone, uneven, but still great. And at the end, at the last moving, cathartic moment, man, I cried. Interwoven motifs, the universal portrayed through the personal, a deeply talented cast and some really excellent dialogueshy;—it’ll get me every time.
“Fabulation” is playing in the Davis Center through November 4th. Tickets available at http://performingarts.georgetown.edu/
